The Art of Being: June 2022

The Art of Being
Deborah Chandler, Ph.D.
Winning

June 2022

Do I like winning? Indeed, I do. It proves how special I am. Winning brings status to my being. Unfortunately, winning is a short-lived victory. Winning is teamed with losing in the perpetual duality of opposites. Good- Bad. Happy-Sad. Winning-Losing. Dark-Light.

The realm of opposites spills out of our activities. We become attached to one dimension and struggle to avoid the other. Such is life. Highs and lows.
Where is inner peace? Serenity? Fortunately, we have an escape path, a way to transcend this constant battle of opposites.

Within each of us is the hidden realm of inner life. We find it by meditating, laughing, loving, and creating. In these activities, we touch into a dimension that is beyond the opposites. This transcendent dimension is more subtle than the smug satisfaction of winning.

This sublime aspect is found beyond the information gathered by our senses. Our five senses of touch, seeing, smelling, hearing, tasting gather information. These senses are data channels. We usually take them for granted and accept the surface information they provide. Each sense organ provides concrete information about the moment. But the power to provide this information derives from a unified source.

Each sensory experience is derived from the unique wholeness that is our profound nature. This wholeness does not end with us; this wholeness joins us to the vastness that is all of existence. Each sensory moment has traveled the energetic pathway into our awareness. If we stop and focus on the awareness, we are closer to the source of our knowing.

Awareness is special. As we step back and reflect on being aware, we are amazed at this incredible ability. We know. It’s not how do we know or what do we know. It is that WE KNOW.

From this perspective, our minds become the sixth sense organ, with thinking being its product. We see; we think. Each idea is the end point of a revelation that begins with awareness.

Awareness flashes forth in each moment of our existence, creating our existence. Awareness is an energetic wave that reveals our lives to us. As we ride that wave, we prepare ourselves, practicing being alert to the moment-by-moment occurrence of our lives emerging.

So, winning is part of the play of the surface opposites. But the great victory is knowing who we really are: the spontaneous emergence of awareness.